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Facebook Fan Page Optimization Tips

admin — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 09:07:23 +0000

The best place you can place your brand on Facebook is through a Facebook Page. As of the time of this writing, over 10 million users become fans of Fan Pages every day. This number should be no surprise — when people “fan” your Page, their friends see it, and your brand spreads organically. What most don’t know is that you can customize this experience for your users. With just a little work, and either some knowledge of simple HTML or the ability to hire a developer to do the work for you, you can have a custom Page up for your business in no time. Here are some tips you can apply to your Facebook marketing strategies.

Maximize Your Avatar Visibility

Profile pictures on Facebook can have a maximum size of 200×600 pixels. This applies to Pages as well. Facebook Pages do not allow background images like Twitter, Myspace, and other services. What you can do, however, is take advantage of that full 200×600 real estate and get your brand in front of the eyes of your fans. This will make sure, regardless of what part of your Page they are on your brand is front and center.

Install the Static FBML App and Add a Custom Tab

Do a search for “static FBML” on Facebook (or just click here), and click “Add to my Page” in the upper-left. A dialog pop-over will appear with a list of Pages you administer. Select the Page you want to customize by clicking the “Add to Page” button next to the Page, and when you click the button it will disappear from the list. Now click “Close”.

Now what you want to do is create your tab. To create the tab, just go to your Page and click the link, “Edit Page” in the upper-left below your main Page image. Now when you scroll down you will see a subsection called “FBML”. Click on the “Application Settings” link for that subsection, and another popover dialog will appear. Click “add” next to the Tab field and click Okay. You’ve now just added a blank Tab called “FBML” to your Page. Now you need to customize it.

Add Content to Your Custom Tab

If you go view your Page now, you’ll notice when you click the “>>” tab there is now an “FBML” option in the drop-down. If you click on it, that tab appears in the list of tabs at the top, and you can drag it around (to the extent that Facebook allows you). You’ll notice the tab is completely blank. Let’s add some content to it.

To add content, click on “Edit Page” again on the left below your Page image. Go to the “FBML” subsection again, but this time click the “Edit” link. Now you’ll be taken to a very simple form with a “Box Title” field and an “FBML” field.

Let’s start by changing the title of the tab. As I mentioned earlier, the tab, by default gets called “FBML” when you add it. You probably don’t want to keep that name, so I recommend changing it to something productive, like “Welcome”, or “Introduction”. You can name it whatever you like, depending on your purpose!

Now you’ll want to enter some content. The “FBML” field will take almost any basic HTML. You don’t need to include any , , or tags, as the HTML you enter will only take the place of that whitespace you just saw. All the header stuff is taken care of for you. Play with it and see what you can do.

Customize Your Tab With FBML

Beyond simple HTML you can also enter very simple FBML tags to simplify some of the process. FBML stands for “Facebook Markup Language”, and is meant to be a shortcut for use in Facebook applications. Facebook has also enabled the use of a subset of FBML in the Static FBML application. FBML can be a great way to reduce the amount of HTML you need to enter, while at the same time keeping Facebook’s own look and feel. The format is very simple, and if you are familiar with HTML or XML you’ll pick it up very quickly.

To learn FBML you’re going to want to check out Facebook’s documentation and reference on FBML tags. There is a large reference of these tags on their developer wiki. I recommend you look around and see what’s available, then try them out and see how they work. You can also purchase my book, FBML Essentials, which will give you a little more details on FBML (as well as the Facebook developer platform in general).

Keep in mind that the Static FBML application only supports a subset of what the full FBML reference indicates is available. Unfortunately there is no documentation stating what is, and isn’t supported. Tags that have been confirmed working and are my favorites are:

– displays a specific user’s name in the standard Facebook format

– displays a specific user’s profile picture in the standard Facebook format

– allows you to include Flash applications in your tab

– posts a Facebook live stream widget on your Tab (you must create a new application to do this)

– adds a Facebook comments box to your Tab

If you read the Facebook wiki documentation keep in mind that “loggedinuser” does not work for the uid on the Static FBML App, but “profileowner” does. Beyond that, if you specify the specific user id in that field it should show properly.

Set Your Page to Default to Your New Tab

Now that you’ve created your custom tab using the Static FBML App you may want to set your Page to default to the new tab. This can give you a nice welcome message for your fans. To do so, just click “Edit Page” as I mentioned above. Under “Wall Settings”, click “edit”, and under “default landing tab for everyone else” select your new tab in the drop down. You’re done! Keep in mind that this default tab is only visible as a default landing page for those that are not yet fans of your Page yet.

SEO for Facebook Pages

Your Page is visible to search engines! Now that you’ve created your custom landing page, keep in mind that search engines see the page layout in the same way that someone who is not a fan of your page would see.

If you haven’t yet created a Facebook Page, you should also keep in mind that the Page title can be one of the best places to create a search-engine friendly title for your brand. Be sure this is something that describes yourself and your brand, and that you think others will be searching for. It should also, at the same time, be something familiar to other Facebook users, as this is what they will see in their News feeds as their friends become fans or you post updates. Keep in mind your Page name can not be changed once you create it, so get it right the first time! It can be a pain to have to re-create a new Page and re-establish months of work building your Page if you get it wrong early on.

Top 15 Social Apps for iPhone

admin — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 08:48:25 +0000

There are too many applications for our iPhone, some help us share everyday stories with our family and friends, some help us sort the messy information stored in our device, some help us save money… Sometimes we are lost and do not know what to choose. Here we have selected 15 most popular and useful social applications that would equip your iPhone and help to make your life more easy.

Twitterrific

Twitterrific is an award-winning mobile Twitter client developed by the Iconfactory. It can manage multiple accounts, search Twitter quickly, filter tweets and much more, it works juest like it’s desktop counterpart.

Twitterrific has a beautiful interface and it’s easy to use. Just like somebody says: makes twittering a breeze!

Facebook

Facebook for iPhone allows you to do most of the things Fachbook allows you to do. Stay connected and share information with friends, start a Facebook Chat, check your friends’ latest photos and status updates and etc..

What else more can I say about Facebook? Adding more features to the app would do us a big good, like the push notification. But anyway, those Facebook fans shouldn’t miss this!

beejiveIM

beejiveIM 3.0, developed by Beejive, allows you to stay connected to all your friends on multiple networks like MSN, Facebook IM, GoogleTalk, AIM/iChat, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and MySpace IM all at the same time. The app provides a reliable and efficient network without per-message charges for it uses your existing data plan.

Just like many others, I love this app for it’s really good! Works smoothly, fast and reliable. Worths every cent!

eBuddy

eBuddy is a great helper in instant messaging by providing reliable, fast and useful features. You can stay connected with your buddies from MSN, Yahoo, AIM, ICQ, Gtalk and Facebook; you can stay online when you exit the app; you get push notifications for incoming messages; you can do many things with it.

eBuddy would be much better it it has a landscape mode and allows us to stay online for a longer time( 30 minutes is definitely not enough!). But what can we say? It’s free.

Whrrl

For those who love to create stories and capture every moment in their lives, this is it. Whrrl allows you to capture the moments you want to keep track of and automaticlly organizes your content into stories for you to share with family and friends through email, Facebook or Twitter. The app is developed by Pelago,Inc.

Cool layout and easy to use, Whrrl is especially helpful when I suddenly have something to share with my friends, and I can always get quick responses from my friends.

Fring

Another mobile internet community that allwos friends to connect and share experiences. You can use your favourite online communication tools and communities to stay in touch with your friends in real time, you can also enjoy voice calls over WiFi. The app is developed by Fringland Ltd..

The app works fine so far, but it would be better if it could improve its reliability and stability. Many reports there is problem with its push notification, but works fine for me. Looking forward to its new update version.

Waze

Waze works somekind like Wikipedia, the building of the road maps and real-traffic updates are contributed totally on the users. The more users join in and help, the better the data would be and the better it could serve the drivers for daily commute. Constantly-updated road map, real-time traffic updates, automatic rerouting, live reports from users on the road and many other useful informations on the road are all available.

I have to admitt this is a great concept. Many works have to be done but it would be awesome if more people use it and make it better. Keep going!

Quip

Good news for those who love sharing photos! Developed by Addy Mobile, Quip allows you to send photo texts in a easier way and with no extra charge. Sending Quip messages does not count against your iPhone’s text message plan and your friends won’t pay high MMS fees for receiving Quip.

One thing big about this app is it allows you to send to even non-iPhones, even though they have to go to the link of the photo. But still, a big progress for many iPhone apps could only work for iPhones.

Loopt

Loopt allows you to see where your friends are and what they doing through interactive maps, and you can instantly share your location, photos and comments with friends. Facebook and Twitter can be linked to simultaneously update all your blogs and social networks, or you can explore places and events recommender by your friend…

Overall, Loopt is a good app for you to catch up with your friends. It could do a lot better with push notification and if it could show where a person is at even though the app isn’t opened.

WhosHere

Developed by MyRete, WhoHere is an app to help you meet people near you with similar interests. You just have to fill out your profile and it’ll automaticly show you hundreds of matches. If you are interested in someone, you can talk with text message and exchange pictures within WhoeHere itself with no SMS fees, meaning you don’t have to give out your phone number, email or IM address unless you want to.

A great app where you can meet really awesome people, would be even greater if more people use it. But sometimes you have to beware of the bad people, not the app’s fault though.

iNXES XBox Live Friends

Inspired by NXE, the 1337.com team came up with the app to iPhone/iPod touch. It provides the full NXE-style gamer card, complete profile which shows name, location and biography, detailed play history, automatic sorting of gamers by status and gamertag among many others. It’s a great helper to XBOX 360 players.

Next time when you want to sign in your XBOX 360 and play your favourite game, you can check out this app and see who’s on first. It’s always much more fun to have all your friends online. It’s a bit slow, but overall a good app.

iCall Free VoIP

iCall is an application that allows you to make and receive phone calls over WiFi even when you don’t have a cell signal. Free ad-supported USA & Canadiaan calling are available, calls don’t count towards your cell calling plan, no roaming charges, you can also switch cell phone calls to VoIP.

The app does what it says, even someone complains it doesn’t sound like me through the call. Whatever, it really saves me lot.

Emoji iEmoji Icons

Want to express yoursely in a more vivid way? Want more than just a when texting to your friends? If you get Emoji icons into your iPhone, you could get a keyboard that lets you type smileys, hearts and other cute icons and express your feelings with pictures and faces. The app was developed by SpiceLoop, and was welcomed by many iPhone users.

These icons are really cute, and they are especially helpful for an emotional person like me. But it would be even sweeter if the icons can be sent to non-iPhones.

Bump

Bump is an application developed by Bump Technologies LLC. With the app inputed, iPhones users can exchange contact information by just bumping their hands together. The contact information would be saved directly into your address book and photos saved into your camera roll.

It’s like a secret ceremony, bumping hands together, but actually we are exchanging datas. You may wonder if it really works? Yes, it does work, it works well.

Black Book

Black Book is a great helper when it comes to sorting the informations in your contact book. It helps you to keep a visual list of contacts and their details in your book, keeps private images of contacts and many other features. The app is developed by Vurgood Applications.

For me, Black Book’s biggset contribution is to spare me of the embarrassment of seeing someone’s face but forgetting his or her name. It happens all the time.